La Ciccia

I don’t normally write about food here, but I had such an amazing dinner earlier this week, I just had to. La Ciccia is a Sardinian restaurant located on the edge of Noe Valley near Glen Park. It was recently featured in a New York Times article on San Francisco Italian restaurants, but I’ve wanted to try it since it was featured on Check, Please! Bay Area. Seeing everyone on that show praising the restaurant so highly, and having recently watched the Sardinia episode of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations, where everything he ate looked so incredibly delicious, La Ciccia quickly moved to the top of my list of restaurants to try. However, it took me some time to get there since most of my restaurant budget these past few months has been devoted to pre- or post-theater excursions.

In any case, I finally went, and it was delicious.  For antipasti, we started off with a plate of prosciutto, Sardinian flat bread, and an octopus stew in a spicy tomato sauce.  Despite being in public, I couldn’t resist “saucing” my plate, as they say in France. (Yes, the French have a verb for soaking up the sauce on your plate with your bread, and, while acceptable at home, one shouldn’t do it in a restaurant.)  For primi, we had two of Bourdain’s favorite dishes, Spaghittusu cun Allu Ollu e Bottariga (bottarga is a dried fish roe that is shaved over the fresh pasta) and Malloreddus a sa Campidanese (semolina gnochetti with a pork ragu). I think they’ve spoiled me for all other pastas; I would go back for either of those in a heartbeat. As a secondo, we shared the sea bream special. I’m not a huge fan of fish, but I really enjoyed this simple preparation. To finish, we shared the Truta de Arriscottu, a ricotta and saffron cake served with honey and almonds, a perfect dessert that wasn’t too sweet. To me, it had a taste very similar to madeleines, although no Proustian side effects. The wine suggested by our waiter (random side note: a gorgeous man from Milan), a lovely Cannonau, or Grenache, went perfectly with the food.

Heaven, absolute heaven.